


moonlit midwinter

by lizardlesbian



Category: Moominvalley (Cartoon 2019), Mumintroll | Moomins Series - Tove Jansson
Genre: ADHD Character, F/F, Gen, Mentions Of Gender Dysphoria, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Self-Worth Issues, Too-Ticky is the only existing social worker in the entirety of Moominvalley and its surroundings, Trans Female Character, as well as the entire Mymble family, especially Moominpappa's Memoirs, gratuitous references to the Moomins novels without respecting any of them properly, kind of nebulous canon setting, mentions of Snufkin and Little My, mentions of dysfunctional family dynamics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-16
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:07:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22758277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lizardlesbian/pseuds/lizardlesbian
Summary: After awakening from her winter sleep all alone, a young Mymble makes new friends, falls in love and rediscovers herself in unexpected ways amidst the snow.
Relationships: Joxaren | The Joxter/Mymlan | The Mymble, Mymlans dotter | The Mymble’s Daughter/Too-ticki | Too-Ticky, also some small references to
Comments: 5
Kudos: 30





	1. In which a decision is made

**Author's Note:**

> Some small notes before starting:
> 
> \- This story is set in Moominvalley (2019), but since Mymble's daughter hasn't appeared in the show (YET) I had to fit in her character by snipping some bits of the Moomins novels/comics into the show canon.
> 
> \- Exactly because of the point above, there are no references in the fic about her role in Midsummer Madness or Moominvalley in November (etc.) in this fic, because the show didn't put her in those episodes.
> 
> \- There are, however, references to the other novels in which she appeared and that haven't been adapted into the show yet, especially Moominpappa's Memoirs. There's a lot of references to Moominpappa's Memoirs.
> 
> \- Since there haven't been any episodes about the Memoirs so far, for my own personal indulgence I put that Mymble's daughter, Snufkin and Little My already know they're siblings in this story.

It happened during a night, one like many others.

On such a night, a young Mymble opened her eyes and was quite confused to find herself in a bed, completely surrounded by darkness.

She couldn’t remember when she had fallen asleep, or where. Mymbles are great creatures, but memory has never been their strongest point, and this one in particular happened to be the firstborn of one of the most forgetful mymbles ever known, so it was to be expected for her to be of the same ilk, like that saying about fruit and trees falling went.

It took quite a lot of blinking and rubbing her eyelids for her to be able to see past her own nose, for she wasn’t as lucky as some of her siblings and wasn’t blessed with night-eyes, but when the useless things finally got used to the dark, she found that the bed she had fallen asleep into was her own, inside her small home. This fact did nothing to soothe her befuddlement. It was unusual, she reflected, to be in one’s own home and have no memory on how they had gotten there.

She climbed down from the bed and set upon exploring the few rooms of her house, in hope that the walk would jog her lacking memory. The floor was cold under her feet, cold enough to make a chill crawl up her back, but she decided not to search for where her slippers had ended up. _One forgotten thing at the time_ , she thought, _or I’ll end up getting lost in my own thoughts and forget both of them entirely._

The house, usually comfortable despite how cramped it was, was unrecognizable even to her owner. The pantry, usually stocked with enough food to feed a small army, was almost completely empty save for a couple jars of jam (most likely some old gift from Moominmamma) and a few tins of canned somethings she couldn’t recognize. Her cozy kitchenette and small dining table were both covered in dust, and all other furniture were covered in drapes, making it appear like a pack of ghosts had taken residence while she was asleep.

It reminded her of the tiny ghost she had made friends with many years prior, and she smiled fondly at the memory. She snapped herself out of it: no time for the past, not when she didn’t even remember her present.

She began pacing back and forth. The house felt empty, unnaturally so. The most unnatural thing about it was the complete silence, for usually it would be full of noises, screams and fighting and laughing. One of the drapes captured her attention: it was covered in claw marks or full of tears, like a small animal couldn’t stand the sight of them and decided to unleash its fury upon them.

“Oh,” She remembered the Mymble quite suddenly. “Little My, of course!”

How could she forget her dear sister just like that! She called out for her, ready to search every nook and cranny she may have fallen asleep into, when another realization stopped her from doing so.

Her younger sister didn’t live with her anymore. She had taken to staying at the Moominhouse after the last time Mother visited the Valley and ended up leaving her behind. Right after she had heard the news, Mymble had hurried to see her sister, to offer her a place in her own home until Mother made her way back to retrieve her. It was pretty common for their mother to leave some of the kids from her flock with her eldest daughter when she passed by, after all. Usually, Mymble ended up taking care of the older ones, so that she could prepare them properly before they inevitably decided to leave the nest. Since she was already minding a couple of siblings close to My’s age at the time, it seemed natural to take her in too.

Instead, that tiny menace of her younger sister had laughed, right in her face. Her reply had been dry, and quite rude: “What’s the point of trading a house full of noisy mymbles for the same? No thanks, I prefer to stay right where I am!”, before dunking back inside Moominmamma’s teapot.

Despite how irritated she had been initially about her refusal, Mymble hadn’t been able to bear a grudge at her over this matter. She just told Moominmamma to call her if her sister ever caused her excessive amounts of problems, and left Little My behind. She had too much to do to worry about her sister, and if she allowed herself a moment of honesty, she understood Little My perfectly: she hadn’t been much older than My when she joined a ragtag group of orphans and inventors to escape her mother and her too-many siblings. What a coincidence that Little My would abandon their family to stay with some Moomins, too! She thought once again about that saying about apples and trees that she couldn’t quite recall properly at the moment.

The destroyed drapes were probably just the evidence of My’s occasional visits, or of when Mother came by with her new litter of little ones. Still, this didn’t explain the silence.

She looked around a little more, opened a few cabinets, checked the drawers, but the search resulted in nothing. She was truly alone. Not even a single spare sibling crashing at her place could be found. Not even some leftover lad she had brought home from some party and forgot about until she woke up the morning after and found him drooling pathetically on the carpet.

She wrinkled her nose. While the uncharacteristic cold of the house wasn’t bothering her much, taken as she was in her thoughts, the smell was becoming unbearable. The air felt stuffy in a way that it had never been, so she reached for one of the windows, intending to open it, but found the task harder than it would have normally been. It was almost like something was blocking the window from outside. After some hard pushes that resulted in her almost losing her balance and falling face-first against the glass, she succeeded, and the sight that greeted her left her speechless: the Valley was covered in white, much like the furniture in her house, and though it was night, the full moon up in the sky made it shine like daytime.

She stuck her head outside the window, marveling at the beauty of the snow falling against the light of the moon. She exhaled, and noticed that she could see her breath like a small cloud forming and the dissipating.

“It’s winter…” she murmured to herself, because she found that she couldn’t quite tolerate the silence and had to fill it in some way.

Then finally, like the last piece of a puzzle, it clicked inside her head.

“Oh dear, I was hibernating, wasn’t I?” She had gone to sleep a little early that year, too: Mother had visited towards the end of November to retrieve back the triplets Mymble had been taking care of for the past season. Blabbered something about their father making a comeback and demanding to see them at once. This fact in itself was quite extraordinary: Mother had many, many lovers, but very few of them stuck around enough to see their children brought to life. Mymble’s own father had been the first of a long series of deadbeat dads, and the only one of Mother’s beaus who she remember taking some interest after his own child. He was, tragically, exactly as forgetful as Mother, and went and forgot he even had a son for a long while. But that was another story entirely, the point was:

“I’ll get them out of your hair right before winter, dear daughter, so you can have an easy rest!” She had exclaimed with that booming voice of hers, made for towering over the racket twenty or so children could make in a single house, and left her on the same day.

And so Mymble found herself alone all of the sudden, with no other sibling left to take care of and not even a boyfriend to keep her company. The last one had ran away faster than the wind when he found Mymble playing on the beach with Little My, and mistaken her for her own daughter. Good riddance, she had thought at the time: anyone stupid enough to think she could ever have kids of her own wasn’t company that deserved to be kept around.

It had been quite a while since the last time she found herself truly alone, ever since she had started living alone, and ought to take the time to appreciate her newfound freedom. When she was younger she had wished for nothing more than a little solitude and less responsibilities, and even after she had her fair share of adventuring and went away to live on her own, she hadn’t been allowed that. By all means, she should be grateful.

Instead, a strong sense of loneliness hit her. In similar circumstances, other times, she would have used the opportunity for a new adventure somewhere far away. She would have gone to call some friends, hitch a ride, and maybe return the following season or two back home, if she felt like it. But this year it was much too late, and all her friendships had already sailed South without waiting for her, and she didn’t much like traveling on her own, never had.

So, with both Snufkin away and Little My already getting ready for hibernation with her other family, Mymble had made the decision to go to sleep early. It seemed like the best idea: she would sleep soon, wake up early, and greet the Spring full of energy.

“But then, why am I awake now? It’s not proper to be up so early. I ought to be still sleeping.” She asked the moon, the only one able to hear her voice in a sleeping Valley.

The moon had no answers for her, but in her splendor, the loneliness receded a little, and Mymble felt as if it was watching over her. She would have stayed longer looking at it, but after some snowflakes hit her face and made their way into her nightgown, causing even more shivers, she decided to retreat back into her house.

Going back to sleep right away would have been the safest choice. Facing the cold without a proper winter coat would be reckless, and trying to do so without anyone else around, would be even more so.

Yet….

Yet Mymbles didn’t have any true _need_ to hibernate. Mother only did it when she had a home to sleep inside, otherwise she could happily skip and so could her children, and Mymble herself only hibernated when she had to stay in her house in Moominvalley for the winter. This wouldn’t be the first winter sleep she lost, she knew, and who knew how many interesting creatures and sights the Valley in the winter could be hiding!

She wondered if this was all a sign for something. If there was some bigger reason she couldn’t yet see for this early awakening. She cursed her inability to read the cards, not for the first time in her life.

The moon shined upon her, and made a decision in her place. It was time to search for a sturdy pair of boots and a thick cloak. Time to go see who was up and about: she was in the mood for a chat.

*

As it was, mymbles didn’t usually possess much on the matter of winter clothing, not even those like her who had seen the snow before. She didn’t quite remember where all of it went, because she was _sure_ she owned something useful for the weather at some point. More likely she had imposed all her warm clothes onto some little sibling before they departed from her home, or to some friend in need. She’s sure at least one of her old knitted scarves went to Snufkin when he showed up with a nasty cough one Spring, after losing the only one he had while he was running away from some cops. On one occasion, she could remember she had gifted her woolen hat to a forest creep, lamenting that it was too ugly for her to have any use for it now.

The result was nothing in her wardrobe thick enough to stand against the snowfall without becoming soaking wet within minutes, let alone cloaks, hats, scarves or any kind of practical boots.

It also appeared that, behind her front door, a thick screen of solid snow was blocking her house’s only exit. Truly, every sign was telling her to give it up and stay inside.

Mymbles, however, were known to be a resourceful kind. It took while a lot of wading deep into her closet, then digging into all her drawers and even under her bed, but she did manage to find an old, patched-up pair of pants and a felt jacket that suited her current needs well enough. Both of those things had belonged to some old boyfriend of hers, and she must have forgotten to throw it out after he inevitably broke her heart. As she put them on, she figured that wherever that nasty fella was now, he probably didn’t miss them much. She then sacrificed a tablecloth that felt of a good enough material to shield her from the worst of the snowfall, and within a handful of minutes on her sewing machine, she had managed to fashion it into an odd-looking, but comfortable cloak. For the boots, still no luck, her usual ones red would have to do. She put multiple pairs of socks on her feet, hoping for it to be enough to keep the chill away.

She contemplated the sparse fur on her paws, and realized that no amount of creativity would change the fact that she didn’t own any gloves.

Most mymbles were hairless, with the only exceptions being their paws and arms, legs, and, rarely, on their faces. Some of her siblings turned out furrier than others, but it had never been her case - something that she had been very glad for when she was a child, for it made it impossible to mix her up for a boy, but that at the present time constituted quite the problem. Even in the manner of a winter coat, she would have very little to work with in the near future. For now, she resolved to use another pair of socks to keep them covered. It wasn’t proper, but it would do the trick.

Since the door wouldn’t budge, she resolved to crawl out of the window, and did so with little difficulty. When outside, she made sure to close it back properly, as to not let her little home get snowed in in her absence. She promised herself to make sure to find something to shovel her door free soon, so she could actually come back inside.

She raised her eyes up to the sky to smile at the moon and thank her for her guidance. Taking in her surroundings, she breathed deeply. The icy wind burned her throat and she found herself smiling even wider because of it.

She could count on one paw how many times she had seen the snow in recent years, and she wasn’t ashamed to admit she forgot how amazing it felt to stand under the falling snow, to watch it as it fell, to let it touch your face and fill your senses. She couldn’t help but laugh, no matter how cold it was or how weird it was to recognise her own laughter as the only sound around. She skipped through the white field, ran and laughed out loud like a madwoman.

When her breath became too short to continue running, she resolved to go back to her original plan and find someone to share the beauty of the season with, this time without getting distracted in silly games. She rediscovered roads usually known and now difficult to recognise under all the white, saw how every single hill, field and tree transformed. It was marvelous, and she wished she could press the memory of them behind her eyelids, so she could compare the pictures with those she had in her mind of the Valley in the Spring, in Summer, in Autumn, and properly catalogue all the little differences.

It took her longer than it usually would to reach the little bridge that brought to the Moominhouse, and standing up in the middle of it, she squinted towards it. Thankfully, the snow falling wasn’t thick enough to obscure her vision yet.

She heard from her sister that sometimes Moomintroll woke up early from his winter rest, and Mother and her flock spent part of her winter with the rest of family too, that infamous time she left behind Little My. This meant that it wasn’t _impossible_ for moomins to stay up during the colder months, and so she figured that out of all her neighbours, they would be her best option at finding some company for the time being.

But judging from the way all windows were sealed shut with no ladder coming down from Moomintroll’s bedroom, and from the giant pile of snow that blocked out from sight the main door, it seemed that no troll or mymble was up. For now, at least.

It was a little discouraging, for sure. She had been hoping that she could crash at the Moomins’ place and chatter her way into the new season in their company, maybe make use of Moominmamma’s kitchen to make herself something to nibble on - she was only noticing now how famished her interrupted hibernation had left her. But no mymble ever let the sight of a single shut door bring her down, and surely not _this_ Mymble!

Time to search elsewhere, before thewind threw her into the icy water of the stream and brought her winter adventures to a nasty ending. With a small bow, she silently greeted her sister and friends, wishing the moon a safe hibernation for them, before turning back and continuing her pursuit for company.

Her next destination was Mrs. Fillyjonk’s brand new place. The lady had always been nasty to her and her family, but her good manners imposed her not to turn away anyone coming to visit for tea. It was a trick Mymble had used often before: if she asked nicely enough, trembling her lower lip just so, not even an old coot such as her could turn her away. But when she appeared in sight of the fillyjonk’s home, she found it much similar to the Moomins’ and her own when she had awoken: dark inside, sealed shut, the front door piled in so much snow it would have been impossible to make her way inside even with the use of force.

She tried Mr. Hemulen’s place next, but even there, she didn’t have any luck. She ventured further on, and found that even the Park Keeper and his missus were asleep, and so many others. Some houses didn’t even appear to be occupied anymore, signaling families that had decided to move elsewhere for the coldest months. 

The more she went on, the more her initial splendor began slowly turning into dread. Nobody seemed to be awake, and it made her wonder exactly how _early_ she had awoken. It was a thing to wake up in February, but if even the strictest Hemulens were still sleeping, what month could it be?

Right at that moment, the wind picked up strength and its way under her clothes and froze her breath in her lungs for a second. She raised her nose to the sky, to find that the moon was slowly disappearing under the clouds. Her heart skipped a beat. Preoccupied as she was, the snowstorm had turned nastier without her even noticing, and if she didn’t want the Lady of the Cold to sneak up on her, she needed to get a move on.

Returning home was the only option left now. She would attempt to sleep again, wake up in the Spring and this silly little interruption would turn out to be nothing more than a silly dream.

But looking at her surroundings, she only saw the forest, its trees naked and skeletal in this season, and the more she tried to look for it, the more she realized she had no idea what the path to her house was anymore. She kept going, hoping that if she continued walking, eventually, she would find herself somewhere she recognized, but no such luck.

Everything around her had fallen into a state of absolute silence without the usual songs of birds and chatter of creeps. It reminded her of her empty house. It terrified her, and so to keep the fear away she sang. She didn’t have much of a singing voice, but she had never cared before if it sounded good or not, for she just loved to sing, and the act alone brought joy to her heart and calmed her rabbiting pulse.

The beach came in sight and with it, the sound of the sea. She hadn’t recognized the path, but thankfully her feet had still brought here somewhere familiar. She sighed in relief: from here, she could safely find her bearings and return to her house before things turned very dangerous for her.

Something captured her attention, thought: in the darkness in the middle of the sea, a light shined bright and warm. She squinted towards, wondering if her eyes were getting so cold they were starting to play tricks on her, but it was real. In fact, it was coming from inside the Moomins’ bathing-house.

She stopped in her steps to reflect. She _should_ return to her home, before the snowstorm trapped her in, and Groke knew what would become of her then. But a light meant other people were awake, and meant not having to be alone.

“What should I do…” she murmured to herself, looking upwards for guidance. The moon was still up, not for long, but she still casted her pale light on the beach, making the way to the bathing-house clear. It felt like an invitation.

Twice during the same night Mymble followed the moon’s influence. She began walking briskly towards the light, and the irony of that wasn’t lost on her.

“Moomintroll? Dear, is that you?” She called out for her friend as she made her way along the pier. Maybe she could have misunderstood the sight of the house, and he could be awake as well. Maybe the rest of his family was with him as well, and how wonderful it would be, to be among friends again!

Yet, when she opened the door, no moomin greeted her or made comments about how she could possibly be awake at such time. In fact, nobody was inside at all! Not only that, but there were a lot of things that she didn’t remember belonging to the bathing-house the previous summer, like the stove pushed in a corner of the room or the pot of _something_ placed upon it, the coat rack, the wooden knick-knacks filling various surfaces, or even the weird musical instrument whose name she couldn’t recall at the moment.

The place seemed lived in. Yet, nobody was there.

“How peculiar,” she commented. She got rid of her sodden cloak, boots and cloak, hanging them on the coat rack and pushing it closer to the stove so they could dry. After some reflection, she also took off her pants and jacket and left them to dry, leaving her in only the coloured nightgown she had woken up in, and then sat herself down in front of the stove, too, hugging her knees close to her chest. Her face was burning slightly, but she didn’t back away. Instead, she untied her long hair, lamenting the lack of brush to fix it with, and allowed it to dry in front of the fire.

After she had warmed up enough to regain the feeling in her paws, she tied back her hair again and made her way towards the pot. She raised its lid, and the sole smell of fishing stew was enough to make her mouth water: she hadn’t eaten in what could be months, and nothing felt better than food after going without for some time. Sending a quick thank you to the unknown cook, she grabbed a wooden plate she found nearby and gave herself a generous serving of soup from the pot, making sure to close the lid again once she was done. She wouldn't want whoever made it to come back and find it cold, after all.

Once she was done filling her belly and had put the clean dish back to its place, she sat down against a corner of the bathing-house, enjoying the warmth.

“I could happily live here if I had to, this doesn’t look like a bad place to spend the rest of the winter in. Sadly, I need to return home.” She thought aloud, but, when she tried to raise to her feet, she noticed her body wasn't cooperating, and only then she realized she could feel her eyelids begin to drop. All the excitement she had felt upon waking and the fear of getting lost in the forest had left her so exhausted she hadn’t even noticed how heavy her limbs had turned once they were out of the cold.

A little nap, then, to recharge her energies before she had to go out once again. Just ten minutes, maybe half an hour, then for sure she would be on her way. She curled on the ground, for it felt comfortable enough to sleep on, and the moment she rested her head against her own arm, she was out cold.

Tired as she was, she didn’t hear the shuffling of unseen creatures coming to observe her, or feel them retrieve a large quilt from the cabin, and put it on her sleeping form.

She didn’t wake even when the true owner of the bathing-house made her return.


	2. Introducing Too-ticky, and the beginning of an unlikely cohabitation

She didn’t wake to the blooming of snowdrops, like a small part of her had hoped. There was no grass making its timid appearance among the melting snow, no sound of a mouth-organ being played in the air, far away from her small house, but close enough that she could hear it and smile fondly. Especially, there was no Little My jumping on her stomach, calling her lazybones and wreaking havoc on her bed covers. Mymble was the kind of person that woke up last from hibernation, so her ever-so-kind little sister gave her a little help, every year.

She opened her eyes, slowly, and she was exactly where she had fallen asleep last: still lying on the ground of the Moomins’ bathing-house, though her limbs were intertwined in a quilt she had never seen before. She was groggy and her arms weren’t responding properly to her wishes yet, so she ended up trapping herself further in the quilt for an embarrassing amount of time, before she finally managed to kick it off.

There was music in the air, she then notices, but it wasn’t the familiar sound of her half-brother making his yearly return to Moominvalley. The instrument being played was different, for once, and its melody was one she had never heard of before, yet it made her so melancholic she felt like she’d always known it.

She sat up, and the sight that greeted her was of a creature she'd never met before. Her memory was spotty, but she was sure she would have remembered someone as peculiar looking as the stranger. She was stout and delightfully round, and she carried the air of somebody who knew quite a lot about everything.

The stranger was playing the barrel-organ (ah, that was what the instrument was called!), and Mymble could recognize the sounds of a flute accompanying her music. Yet the more she looked around, the more she realized it was only the two of them in the bathing-house.

“A ghost,” she murmured to herself, with as low a voice tone as she could manage to avoid interrupting the musical performance. She glanced about, trying to look for chains floating about, doors being slammed or books being thrown all around, the common tell tale signs of the presence of an undead spirit in her experience, but she saw none of the such.

Instead, the music came to a stop. It stopped the same way the wind stops after a violent gust: a gradual fading away, until nothing is left anymore, and it makes you wonder if the wind had ever been there to begin with.

“Invisible shrews,” the stranger told her, as if that explained anything about all that was happening.

“Excuse me?”

“That’s what those creatures you have called ghosts are. They’re too timid to be visible, yet their company is very much felt. It was them who covered you properly in your sleep.” The strange woman explained, not unkindly, and to demonstrate this she placed a paw near the table. Sure enough, something that couldn’t be seen climbed on it and its shadow could be seen climbing onto the stranger’s shoulder. “They hide here and there, and they share this house with me.”

“Oh, my!” Mymble exclaimed. She had heard of creatures turning invisible, even met a couple poor folks that had turned transparent herself before, but never something so small. “Thank you all so much for your kindness! I would have woken up with a cold, if it weren’t for you.”

A couple somethings scurried onto her quilt, unseen and unheard except for the quiet sound of their feet stomping on the wooden floor of the bathing-house. The feeling of them was very, very real though: Mymble ran her fingers through their fur, cautious with her claws. She could count five on them by touch alone, but surely there were more hiding.

Once they got tired of being petted and quietly shuffled away heavens knew where, she concentrated her attention back to the stranger. She had moved away from the barrel-organ and was now in the process of making tea for the two of them, apparently. Mymble, feeling awkward about being on the ground still, finally shuffled out of the quilt and raised to her feet in order to fold it. The least she could do for imposing was tidying up after herself.

The stranger was giving her a strange look, she noticed. She felt her gaze, but when Mymble turned to meet her eyes, she quickly looked away, staring insistently at the water boiler instead.

Mymble frowned, unable to understand the behaviour. Was something wrong with her? She looked down at herself, and immediately turned bright red: she was still wearing only her nightgown, since she’d left her clothes on the rack to dry off, and while it wasn’t a Paired with the way her hair was untied and ruffled, she must have looked an awful fright.

Mumbling an apology, she quickly put on the now dry pair of pants and wrapped the felt jacket around her shoulders. It wasn’t much in the matter of clothes, but it was all she had, and it seemed to be enough to snap the stranger out of her awkwardness. Mymble was at the table finishing tying up her hair in a loose ponytail, in the hope that this hair tie wouldn’t snap too, when the stranger sat down in front of her, handing her a cup of tea. It was unsweetened, but Mymble resolved not to bring the matter up, and drank her bitter tea without any grimace.

The stranger wasn’t asking her any question, only sipping at her cup. She was waiting for Mymble to explain herself, she decided, so she decided it was time for an apology.

“I’m quite sorry for sneaking inside your home.” She said, mortified. “I only meant to find some reprieve from the snowstorm and be off, instead I fell asleep.”

The stranger waved off her apologies off like they were nothing. “I don’t mind. Better you came inside than for me to find your corpse lost somewhere in the forest. It’s quite hard to dig a grave in this season, you know? The ground is too frozen for it, and coffins are a bother to make in a pinch.”

Mymble argued with herself on whether or not to ask how she knew this, and resolved on letting things be. She wasn’t sure she really wanted to know.

“Who are you?” She asked instead. It was awkward, to be in a stranger’s home in  _ deshabille _ , and not even know their name. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you around the Valley before, though I’ve lived here for a long time.”

“You don’t know me, but I know you. Or, well, I know  _ of _ you.” Replied the stranger. “I made acquaintance with young Moomintroll last winter. He talks a great deal about all his friends, and he has mentioned you. Something about you being the elder sister of his adoptive sister - I have to admit, the family dynamics slipped away from me a bit.”

Mymble’s face lightened up in recognition. “I think I’ve heard of you, too! You’re the kind soul who saved Moomintroll from dying of hypothermia. Little My told me about you! You’re… Uh…”

Mymble couldn’t help the embarrassing silence that followed, while she tried her hardest to recall the name. She had never been great at remembering names, and this had caused more than one terrible offense in her acquaintances. Once, she had even forgotten the name of her boyfriend, though it wasn’t her fault, really: Hemulens had the terrible habit of picking all similar names, it was terribly hard to tell them apart. Much more sensible to give them all the same name, or let them pick a completely different one.

Thankfully, the stranger didn’t appear to be the kind of creature that threw a temper tantrum over a forgotten name. She looked like she had never had a temper flare once in her life, really.

“I’m Too-ticky. I live on an island, but I come and go from Moominvalley whenever there's any need for my presence. We must have simply missed each other every time I visited.” Too-ticky said. It was fair: for all Mymble did live in the Valley, she traveled often, and often spent time at her mother’s place or with her siblings.

“And now you live… here?” She glanced around, curious. That explained the new choices in interior design, thought how one could turn a bathing-house into a living space, she had no idea.

Too-ticky nodded. “This has been my home for many winters, though I can’t say for certain it will always be. Maybe I’ll be forced to depart for a long time, or maybe next winter I won’t be here at all. I feel most at peace knowing my future is uncertain.”

Too-ticky, Mymble decided, had a rather grim approach to life, but at least it was a fascinating one.

“Bit lonely, isn’t it?” She reflected, thinking about how the only creatures in the whole Valley to be awake at such time were Too-ticky and a handful of shrews.

“Oh, not at all.! I like the loneliness just as much as I like the company of others, and winter here is always full of surprises.” She made a wide gesture with her paw. “There’s all sorts of wonderful things that can happen while the rest of the world is asleep, you just need to be around to see them.” 

Mymble thought of the beauty of the snow falling the previous day, and couldn’t help but think: what other wonders am I missing by being asleep? “You make it all sound very dreamy,” she murmured.

But what to do? She wasn’t properly prepared for the winter, and she had already risked her safety on her first outing. Perhaps following the moon had been a bad idea.

She finished her tea and raised to her feet, going to grab her makeshift coat and put her boots back on.

“It’s been a pleasure, Too-ticky, but I must be off. I need to return to my winter sleep, and I’ve imposed too much on you, already.”

The woman gave her a look, one that Mymble couldn’t place. She hesitated, then she spoke again.

“You don’t have to leave, if you don’t want to. In fact, you could even stay here until March, and it wouldn’t be of any bother.”

Mymble was stunned by such a bold proposal. “Staying here? But wouldn’t my presence be a bother for you?” 

Too-ticky shrugged. “As I said, I don’t mind company, and there’s enough space here for the both of us. If you were to return to hibernation, I could just accompany you back home, but it would be troubling if you were stuck alone in your house, with no proper heating or much food.”

She didn’t ask how she knew she was unprepared for staying up during winter, she supposed her choices in clothing spoke volumes on the matter.

“What if I were to refuse?” She asked. It was tempting to stay, it was really tempting, but it would be rude, and Mymble wasn’t like her mother on this matter. She wasn’t the kind of person to disturb an acquaintance’s winter routine out of the blue, just because she felt lonely.

Too-ticky hummed, pensive. “Then I’d say you need to make a hasty return home, for it’s quite late and you never know what sort of folks wander around at this hour. Especially for creatures like you, who never had to face the winter on their own.”

She felt her irritation rise. Mymble was an adventurer at heart, what did this strange woman know of what she had done in her life?

“I can take care of myself,” was Mymble’s dry reply. 

Too-ticky’s answering nod felt like mockery. “I’m sure you can. I’ll still lend you my oil lamp, so you can make a safe return home.”

She was about to refuse the offer out of spite, but from one glance to the small window in the bathing-house she could tell she was gonna need it, so she decided she could just “forget” to return the lamp instead. A new oil lamp was gonna look nice on her bedside table.

“Thank you for the hospitality, goodbye!” She said her goodbyes maybe a little too louder than it was polite, and slammed the bathing house’s door behind her.

It wasn’t snowing anymore, but everything was so incredibly dark outside. The moon was hidden away, or asleep, and her missing presence filled her with a vague sense of loneliness and despair. There wasn’t a single source of light to be found, except for the oil lamp she was holding, and its light was barely enough to see a palm beyond her nose.

The complete silence, thought, was the worst part. The only sound to be heard was her breathing, and the silence was so absolute she swore she could hear her own heartbeat if she concentrated enough. 

She tried moving on, she really did. She was a self-sufficient mymble who never had any fear of the dark. She had survived the Muddler’s terrible cooking, she could survive anything. A step after another, and quicker than lightning, she would be back home. Empty, cold, dusty, but still home, regardless of how uninviting the thought of it seemed at the present moment.

She only managed to walk through the pier and set foot on the beach, before a sound broke the silence, one that turned her blood into ice and made her breath hitch inside her throat: the long howl of a hunting Groke.

That was what made her stop, turn her heels and make a hasty retreat back inside the bathing-house. Brave she might have been, but she wasn’t so daft to risk becoming the snack of a wandering Groke.

“Actually, I have changed my mind. I think I shall like to stay a little longer, if it’s not too much trouble.” Mymble said, locking the door fast behind her as she entered. Her paws were slightly trembling.

Too-ticky, who had already set the table for two, had nothing to say on the matter.

*

A day staying at the bathing-house with Too-Ticky turned into two, which then turned into three, which then stopped being counted altogether. They didn’t have the same way of living: Mymble often went to sleep much earlier than Too-ticky did, and whenever she awoke, her housemate (for this was how she referred to her in her head) was already up and about, probably somewhere far away. When the weather was good enough and she felt up to it, she went out as well and walked as far as her legs took her. She never mentioned returning back to her little house, and Too-ticky never brought the matter up.

Winter, Mymble was slowly learning, was unpredictable in many ways. Approximately two weeks into this strange cohabitation, the weather took another turn for the worst.

A blizzard raged on, so thick it wasn't impossible to set a single step outside the bathing-house without being swept away like a dead leaf in the autumn wind. This time thought, unlike that bout of bad weather that snuck up on her, on her first day awake from hibernation, it didn't clear up the day right after. In fact, it stayed bad the morning after, and the morning after that too, until Mymble got used to seeing nothing but white flakes against the moonless dark of the outside whenever she looked outside the window. Black and white, every day, just black and white.

It was driving her stir-crazy. She could manage a day stuck inside without much problem, or even two, but by the third the very thought of staying inside for yet another day made her feel miserable. The space in the bathing-house wasn’t much, despite it being bigger than it appeared from the outside, and every morning when she awoke, she wondered if perhaps it hadn’t shrunk a couple feet during the night. Mother read her a story of the kind, when she was very small, but she figured she wouldn’t worry about it happening to her until she saw an axe begin swinging from the ceiling.

Without much to do, aside from pacing, playing with her hair and chattering about everything and nothing, she found herself staring at Too-Ticky more and more, often while she worked.

Too-Ticky wasn't having any such problems. She really seemed just as content to be stuck inside as she had been to spend all day long outside. Like she had said on their first meeting, she really didn't mind Mymble's presence much: she could do her own thing whether she was there or not. This also meant that she also didn't pay too much attention to her, and she wasn't one to start a conversation, preferring to leave that to Mymble.

Mymble, who was used to screaming to have herself heard, was both weirded out and delighted by this. She made it her mission to fill every silence that felt unbearable with anecdotes from her family, of her adventures with the crew of the Oshun Oxtra, of her siblings away from her for the winter, whatever she could come up with. She didn't mind much that these conversations were, for the most, completely one sided, and Too-Ticky didn't seem to mind the background noise of her voice. Mymble wasn’t surprised by this: her housemate - if one could call her such, when their shared space was so restricted it seemed ridiculous to call it an “house” - could concentrate through everything.

It wasn’t only her ability to concentrate that was extraordinary. Too-Ticky was proving to be an amazing craftswoman, and if it wasn’t for the boredom filling her every bone with the need to  _ run  _ and  _ jump _ , she would love nothing more than to observe her whittle for the entire day. Her hands were big and rough, with nicks and scars here and there, and seeing them bring a new creation to life was a marvel on its own. She could make pretty much anything without much difficulty. For now, it appeared, she had taken to carving small animals and creatures alike, similar to those one would see around the valley. After she was done with one, she would blow on it lightly to get rid of the remaining wood shavings, and put it inside a basket in the cupboard. It was halfway full with statuines and the such.

When Mymble had tried asking her why she was making them, Too-Ticky had simply shrugged.

“They don't have a reason to exist, they just are, much like you and me”, had been her answer, before giving the finished touches to what appeared to be a miniature elephant. She hadn't said anything else on the matter.

That sentence had absolutely no meaning to Mymble, but it left her stunned enough not to make her ask the question again.

Woodcarving wasn’t all she did. She wrote a lot, sometimes in the tiny journal she kept with her at all times, other times she wrote long letters to an unknown somebody and put them aside, “for when the time will be right to send them”, she said. Sometimes she created projects for pretty much everything, from houses to furniture to musical instruments. On a single occasion, she had played her barrel-organ again, which had delighted Mymble greatly. She had hummed along with it, not daring to sing aloud, too afraid to break Too-ticky’s desire to play by making the wrong movement. She found she missed dancing greatly, but didn’t feel comfortable asking Too-ticky to play for her: they didn’t know each other all that well yet, and she didn’t want to appear clumsy in front of her.

There had been a couple occasions in which Too-ticky had even ventured outside for an hour or two, after taking a glance at their thinning provisions. The first time she went out in spite of the storm, Mymble had wanted to dissuade her from doing so, telling her how dangerous it would be, but she had bitten her tongue. Too-Ticky belonged to the winter, and she surely knew much better than her what was and wasn't dangerous to do. Still, she had waited for her to come back with bated breath, trying to keep herself occupied until she returned. When she did, a couple fishes in her paw and an expression of calm satisfaction on her face, Mymble had been unable to say anything to greet her back, so much was the relief of seeing her alive and whole again.

Sometimes, Too-Ticky did absolutely nothing. She simply sat in silence, her eyes closed in a way that made her look like she was napping or at least close to, but Mymble knew that she was actually lost in deep thought. About what matters, who could know. Probably about things that were impossible to comprehend fully.

To avoid going slowly mad with inactivity, when she had nothing else left to do and had gone long since bored with just sitting in silence and watching Too-Ticky, she took to cooking. Initially it felt presumptuous to make use of Too-Ticky's rations in her place, but she didn't comment the first time Mymble cooked in her place, so Mymble resolved to continue doing it. She cooked simple dishes, whatever she could come up with using only her memories of Moominmamma's cooking, but they were warm and homely, and at every meal, like clockwork, Too-Ticky would compliment her cooking in a way that made her puff out her chest. One wasn’t raised in a big household without knowing how to cook, but nothing felt as good as knowing other people appreciated it.

It wasn’t enough, though. There were only so many meals a day she could make before it went from doing a good deed to wasting important resources. She was feeling enclosed, trapped, and wished for nothing more than a field to run through until her heart was beating so fast in her chest it felt close to bursting. 

“I wish I was also as good at something as you are with your woodworking,” she confessed, on their fourth day of forced reclusion. Today, the weather was so bad that not even Too-Ticky dared venture out, and if they strained their ears enough, they could hear the song of the Lady outside, inviting them to spend the night with her. In reply, Too-Ticky had locked the door, and Mymble had begun talking louder than usual, both to drown out that terrible sound and to just do something. She had tried cleaning that morning, but the bathing-house was too small to take too much of her time, and she didn’t want to risk making the place  _ too _ clean: she wasn’t a fillyjonk after all. So, talking it was.

She had been narrating the tale of how her friend the Joxter had tried to teach her to play the flute once, but had fallen asleep so fast during the lesson she felt very insulted, and so she broke the damn thing on his big, empty head. “I was so angry at the time, but now I know it couldn’t be helped: I've always been useless with my hands. Never learned to play an instrument or a craft, never learned any useful and interesting skill like that. How I envy your ability to carve wood so beautifully!”

It was something that had always nagged at the Mymble. Cooking was to be expected, it was a very basic survival skill, but in the matter of more interesting skills, the kind one can flaunt to others, she had always fallen short. Her mother had tried teaching her how to crochet during her earlier teenage years, to keep her antsy fingers at bay whenever the impulse to  _ do _ was too strong. It had been the first alone time she had gotten with her mother ever since she was way too small to remember it properly, and she had enjoyed it, but between her complete lack of talent for it, and the way everything she had ever made came out so misshapen and lumpy that none of the siblings wanted to even touch them, she had given it up after not too long. It was a shame, thought: she had loved the repetitive motion of it, and she wished she hadn’t thrown away her crocheting kit in a fit of fury. It wouldn’t do much, but it would definitely help to have  _ something _ to do.

“Well, I guess I'm capable of sewing,” she added. It was never good to badmouthing oneself too badly, and she learned sewing when she first started living on her own. It  _ was _ useful. “Ah, but I do that out of necessity. It's not something I'm  _ good _ at, just something I can do.” She concluded with a small laugh.

She expected Too-Ticky not to pay much attention to what she'd been talking about, much like she did with every other one sided conversation they had had so far. Instead, Too-Ticky frowned at her words.

“The fact that it's something you can do means it  _ is  _ a skill.” She said.

“Well, of course, I know that!” she complied. “But it’s nothing grand, I just... know how to do it. I don't create anything new, I just take old things and make them a little more useful, usually by mending them or refashioning them into something different. I don't know how to make big, beautiful dresses that would fit well for a gala, and I have a lot of trouble creating things from scratch.”

“Refashioning  _ is _ a form of creation.” Too-Ticky replied, her tone a little piqued in a way that surprised Mymble enormously. She wasn't letting this point go, she had even stopped whittling, putting both her carving knife and the new piece of wood on the dining table, to turn and give Mymble her full attention.

Mymble hummed. She couldn't quite agree with Too-Ticky on this, but she also didn't want to be stuck talking about her sewing for too long. Much like her failure at learning how to crochet, her sewing left her a sense of dissatisfaction and sadness she couldn't quite shake off. She had seen what Snorkmaiden could make with a free afternoon and a sewing machine, despite being much younger than her, not to mention how industrious her own mother could be with it, and how could she not be, with thirty and more kids on her back?

Compared to them, everything she made seemed pointless and bleek.

“Still, I wish I was good at something like you are. Then at least I would have something to keep my mind occupied while the storm rages on.” She rocked back and forth on her chair. “I feel too jittery, like I'm gonna run into the arms of the Lady of the Cold just because it meant I'm doing  _ something _ .”

She wondered if this was what Snufkin felt like, those days of autumn right before departing: enclosed, trapped like a small beast stuck inside a cage against its will. He was so similar to his father on this aspect: the Joxter had also been unable to tolerate being inside for too long, unless he had to sleep or it was raining. She smiled a little at the memory. How curious it was that while the Joxter wasn't her father and had never even acted as such, a little bit of him had maybe rubbed onto her after so much time spent together. She found herself missing him just a little more, and hoped that wherever he was in the wide world right now, he was warm and safe. Thought, knowing him, he was most likely just spending the winter at her mother's place, or with the Muddler and his wife. He probably was making a nuisance of himself in some way or another, too.

She had gotten lost in her thoughts again, and completely forgot what she had been talking about with Too-Ticky. She gave her an apologetic smile, but her house-mate didn't appear to mind too much.

“I think,” started Too-Ticky. “That there’s no need to be good to learn and enjoy a craft. Nobody is immediately good at something, after all, and the concept of what's considered  _ good _ is entirely subjective. If we let the fear of not being good at something stop us from doing it, we'd never do it. Here,” and she handed over the piece of wood and the carving knife to Mymble. “You can try it out, if you wish.”

“Oh, I could never!” she shook her head, keeping her hands to her chest in case. “I wouldn't wanna intrude, you were working with such joy before I interrupted you!”

“It's not intruding if I'm offering.” Too-Ticky said. She made it sound so very simple, and Mymble had been curious about it. Once, she would have also worried about it being too much of a manly hobby, but in this small bathing-house, with only the two of them, she couldn't quite bring herself to care.

It took only a couple more seconds of reflection before she caved and reached for her offered items. Both the wood and the knife felt alien in the most exciting manner, and she looked at Too-Ticky, as if to ask her what to do with either. In reply, she dragged her chair close to Mymble’s, then gently guided her paws on the wood, murmuring basic instructions on how to hold the knife and how to avoid the risk of cutting herself with it. With how loudly her heart was beating in her ears and how kind Too-Ticky’s paws were on her own, she understood pretty much nothing from her explanations. Then she leaned back and said nothing more, and the moment was over. Too-Ticky simply sat there next to her, leaving her to discover a new craft on her own.

Too-Ticky's gaze on her had a certain gravity to it, but she didn't feel weighed down by it. There wasn’t judgement in her eyes nor any expectation, and this was what spurred Mymble into motion.

It wasn’t easy. She fumbled with it for quite a while, not quite knowing where to start cutting from, what to even make. She wanted to ask Too-Ticky for guidance, but at the same time, she felt that she had to do this on her own.

It didn’t look like much. Then it started to look like a “something” without head nor tail. There was a certain fun in going along without knowing what she was doing, and she understood Too-Ticky’s love for all things uncertain a little more: there was a sense of anticipation she wasn’t certain she had ever felt before.

After a couple hours of struggle, of many mistakes, of cutting too much from the wrong parts and leaving the bits that needed more cutting as they were, she found herself with a misshapen wooden duck in her hands. It was ugly, its beak crooked, and she found herself loving it despite all of its flaws.

What she loved even more was the slight nod Too-Ticky gave her when she showed it to her, triumphantly. 

"Now, that wasn't so hard, was it?" She told her. Mymble didn’t reply. She wanted to call her out on her lie, tell her how it had been so very hard and how the result wasn’t even worth it. Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to: she felt genuine satisfaction at concluding a task successfully.

She expected Too-Ticky to take back her knife, but she made no move to do so. Instead she went to take another one and two new pieces of wood, handing one to Mymble. There was no obligation to it, she knew: if she refused, Too-Ticky wouldn’t be offended. This time, she took it in her hands without any protest.

She didn’t start working right away, though. She couldn’t quite stop herself from staring at her terrible duck. It was ugly, unrefined properly and full of bumps, but instead of the usual disappointment when she made something and it didn’t turn like she had wanted it to, she felt nothing but happiness for her creation.  _ I made this _ , she would think,  _ this is what I can do _ . Even if it was no good,Too-Ticky had been right: there was pleasure in the simple doing of a craft.

She knew she had learned something important today, something to treasure for the future, and it had nothing to do with woodcarving.

“I think I would like to bring my sewing machine here. You think you could help me carry it, when it stops snowing?” 

Too-Ticky nodded, and maybe Mymble was imagining things, or maybe it was wishful thinking, but she thought she’d seen a tiny smile grazing her face, just that moment.

*****

The blizzard died down on the sixth day. Mymble, whose initial restlessness had lessened considerably the last couple of days learning how to whittle from Too-ticky, still found that she couldn’t remember what the air smelled like anymore, and decided it was the right opportunity to stretch her limbs after several days of forced reclusion.

Her housemate had apparently had the same idea as her, because she had been nowhere to be found ever since Mymble woke up.

It was a little sad, waking up alone in a bathing-house, but Mymble understood the need for solitude some people had better than anybody. She prepared dinner for both of them, in case both of them returned home late and were too tired to make it, then she was ready to be off.

While she was putting on her coat, she realized she couldn't stand to wear the pants and felt jacket anymore. They felt too big, they fit awkwardly on her thin figure. She couldn’t walk around in a nightgown either, so she resolved to pack some of her usual clothing when she reached home.

“I’m going back home for a little while, make sure to not eat all of the stew while I’m away, and don’t break anything of importance or I shall be very cross!” She warned all the shrews who were around to hear her, more out of habit than anything else. She would always say the same to siblings whenever she went out shopping and had to leave them home alone for a short while. The shrews didn’t make any noise in response, making Mymble wonder if maybe none of them were even around, and she was currently talking to herself like a madwoman. She shook her head, and stepped out of the bathing-house.

It was still dark outside, but that was to be expected: the winter belonged to the night more than the day. The moon was once again up in the sky though, and Mymble greeted it with a little curtsy.

The air smelled good in a way she wouldn’t have been able to explain in words. She loved the smells the seasons carried with them, kept them tucked in a small corner of her mind, and sometimes when she was outside doing her business she would take a deep breath and exclaim to herself, “Ah! The air smells of Autumn, looks like the cold season is gonna come soon.”

Winter smelled different from all other seasons. It was an energetic smell. With a new spring to her steps, she skipped through the white covered beach, only to stumble at the first patch of frozen snow her boots caught into. After that, she made sure to walk more carefully: it did no good to snap her neck the moment she went out. Why, think how poorly Too-ticky would think of her when she found her like that!

Despite the fact that much more snow was covering even more land than before, she recognized the usual roads much easier than she had the first time. Her first stop was, once again, the Moominhouse. She found herself missing Little My and the Moomins more than ever, but unfortunately, the house was still unchanged from when she had first seen it, weeks before.

It was to be expected. She didn’t allow that to put a damper on her good mood. She just took it as a sign that she needed to move on from her usual company, and went back to her task.

Following the path towards her small house, she caught a glimpse of a hat she knew very well. Sure enough, a little further beyond the road there was a little clearing, and in the middle of it was a known too-ticky, a high heap of snow piled next to her, which she was taking, shaping with her paws and then putting together into another pile, one that had vaguely humanoid appearance. A snowman, she realized. She hadn’t made one in many years.

“Hullo!” Mymble greeted her. “What are you making with all that snow?”

Too-ticky didn’t jump at the sound of her voice, probably having heard her from miles away with the sound her boots made, but she did turn around to wave at her. Her nose was a little red, but aside from that, she seemed completely at peace surrounded by snow.

“I don’t know yet! Some time ago I made a horse for the Lady, but maybe this time I’ll make something completely different. Maybe I’ll make her a little snow person to keep her company.” And saying this, she shaped the snow into the form of a large head, with no nose, no mouth, and only little holes for eyes.

“I see. A snowman for the Lady, maybe?” She suggested. It seemed so romantic to give a sweetheart to such a lonely monster, but Too-ticky shook her head, laughing a little to herself.

“That would be quite rude! I don’t know if the Lady prefers gents or ladies, or neither or both. Maybe the last thing she wants is someone nagging at her! I’ll just make someone who can listen to her sing without dying on the spot.”

Mymble reflected, and found herself agreeing with Too-ticky on the matter. Why, if someone gave her a boyfriend as a gift, she would send it back immediately: boyfriends were a great bother to keep around and satisfied, even when one went looking for the company. 

“Don’t you get cold paws from playing in the snow like that?”

Too-ticky shook her head. “My paws feel just fine. Why? Are yours cold?”

Mymble was about to say yes, but she realized with much surprise that her paws were doing just fine, even if she had refused to put woolen socks. She took a long look at them, and realized that in the last weeks, much like she had anticipated, her fur had turned into a proper winter coat. She hadn’t even noticed the change before that moment.

“No!” She said, surprised herself. “In fact, can I help you make your snow person?”

Too-ticky didn’t agree in words, but she made space for Mymble next to her, which was as good as a spoken invitation. They got to work quietly at first, making the general outline of its body, but Mymble quickly got bored of the peace and quiet, and decided to throw some of the snow at Too-ticky’s hat, knocking it on the ground. She giggled at her surprised expression, alien on that usually calm and composed face, but the surprise turned to mischief faster than she’d anticipated, and soon she was ducking down to avoid a snowball, only to be hit by the one fired right afterwards. Too-ticky’s straw-like hair was wild and covered in snow, and she was grinning. She looked so very beautiful that Mymble couldn’t help but stare, which resulted in a snowball thrown in her face.

It turned into a proper fight very fast, that resulted in no winners, only in wet hair and clothes, and by the end of it they were both laughing too hard at what a mess both of them had turned into to throw one more hit.

Part of the snow person was destroyed in the fight, and how funny it looked, without any arms and part of its face obliterated by snowballs. Still laughing, they restored its original form with only a few handful of snows, and then tried to give it a more definite form. When they stepped away from their creation, they found it more moomin-like that they had intended. It also looked like a rat, if you looked at it from the right angulation, and also like a bear, if you had enough fantasy in you to see it. It was a mixture of everything and nothing, and she found that she loved it. They didn’t give it a name, for it wasn’t their place to do so. If the Lady wanted some company, it would be there waiting for her, and it would offer her its name all by itself.

Mymble was brushing her paws on her coat - a little numb, but still not cold enough for it to be bothersome. Then, like a lightning strike, she remembered her initial plan for the day.

“Oh, I forgot again! I wanted to go retrieve some stuff from my house! It’s a little late for it now...” She sighed. She didn’t mind waiting a little more, but these clothes were starting to really bother her. 

She didn’t like the way men's clothing fit on her body. She understood that wearing them didn’t make her a man, nor did they make her look like one, but they still carried a bad feeling with them. She envied how comfortable Too-ticky looked in her own clothes, though they were decidedly masculine in fashion. She looked good, too, even better than a man would have while wearing the same.

“I’ll come with you. In two, we’ll be much faster carrying it, and we’ll make it back home in no time.” said Too-ticky. 

_ It’s fine, we can do it tomorrow, I don’t wanna impose,  _ Mymble wanted to tell her, but couldn’t bring herself too. She was honest enough to admit that while the cold and the dark weren't bothering her as much anymore, the solitude was still a little difficult to stomach when she wasn’t much used to it, and Too-ticky’s company was more than appreciated. 

In the moonlit valley, while everything was asleep, a mymble and a too-ticky walked side by side like two old friends. What an odd couple they made, with her so lean and tall, fiery bright hair and coat a sore spot among all the white, and Too-Ticky so round and shorter, blending in the snow like she belonged to it.

The moment they arrived, they found that Mymble’s little house was now too covered in snow to be accessible from anywhere. Some time had to be dedicated to shoveling away snow from the front door, for the window was now sealed shut with ice and impossible to force it open without risk breaking it. It was a job that was tiresome for one to do on their own, but between the two of them, they made quick work of it.

The first thing she brought out was her sewing kit and sewing machine, with only some difficulty. Together with them, Mymble also readied a backpack full of old clothes, bedsheets, spare fabric, threads, needles and everything that was necessary for her to work with.

The problems raised when she hauled it outside, and realized they weren’t gonna be able to carry both that  _ and _ the sewing machine at the same times. They would probably have to do two trips, but judging by the sky, there wasn’t much light left of the day to make it back in time.

While she was reflecting on how to resolve such a pickle, Too-ticky picked up the sewing machine without a single word, and started carrying it on her shoulder like it weighed nothing. The sewing machine was an old broken thing from her mother’s house, which Hodgkins had then repaired and improved to make it a gift for her eleventh birthday. It carried so much love and memories with it, but even she could admit it was heavy, bulky and very troublesome to carry around the house.

Befuddled, for a moment she could only stare at her arms and wonder how thick they could be under that jumper of hers. She was ashamed to say she had thought, only for a moment, if Too-ticky could carry her with such ease, too. 

She then shook her head to banish the images from her mind, and hauled up the backpack. It didn’t weigh that much, compared to the machine, but she was tired from the flurry of activity they had found themselves into in the past hours, so she struggled a little bit with it.

The walk back was slow, but they still made it in time before the moon began setting. They were tired and cold, but happy with the fruitious day they had spent together, and even happier to find the shrews had left was still enough soup left for the both of them.

That same night, she made a dress for herself. It wasn’t all that different from the one she usually wore during the other seasons, but it was longer for one, and much warmer, since she had made use of that old felt jacket as lining for her dress. It also had fur around the collar and the cuffs. It was a proper winter dress, if she said so herself.

Thankfully, she didn’t have to. Too-ticky took one look at her and complimented her design, as well as telling her she looked very pretty in it.

Mymble, who was used to receiving compliments from people of all genders, couldn’t quite understand why she became quite so red at her words.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I made the decision not to write Too-ticky's Scottish accent based in the simple fact that English isn't my first language and therefore typing accents is a nightmare to me.
> 
> [The snow moomin actually exists](https://steels0ul.tumblr.com/post/190899503584/me-and-the-kids-made-a-snow-rat-yesterday-it-was)! Me and the kids I work with made it while we were on vacation, playing in the snow (vacation for them, and exhausting four-days job working nonstop for me). According to my coworkers, it looks like a rat, according to the kids, it looks like a bear, and according to me, it's an ugly looking moomin.
> 
> I hoped to publish this chapter sooner, but for work reasons I couldn't manage it. The next chapter will take a little more to come, since I have yet to start it, but hopefully it will be out in a couple weeks, a month at worst.
> 
> Again, many thanks to Shay [Daxiefraxie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daxiefraxie/pseuds/Daxiefraxie) for beta-reading this chapter!

**Author's Note:**

> I have never been able to write a proper fic for Femslash February before, but this year Everything Changes. I have written about half of what I planned to write so far, and hopefully next chapter will be posted next Sunday. 
> 
> A special thanks to my girlfriend , for tolerating my rambles and helping me keep my characterization smooth enough, and to Shay[ Daxiefraxie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daxiefraxie/pseuds/Daxiefraxie) for beta-reading this fanfiction!!
> 
> Find me on tumblr at [steels0ul](http://steels0ul.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
